In this issue:

1. Six Reasons to Get Inspired About Accounting!

This article is for accounting students, not for managers, who also should know accounting and be inspired about studying the subject, but for very different reasons. In upcoming editions of The Student Accountant I’ll go over reasons managers and businessmen should know accounting.

For now, here are six reasons in case you’re in need of some inspiration to continue and progress in your studies:

Get a job: Accounting is an area of knowledge and skill. And it is a skill that it is demand in almost any business out there. Every business needs some sort of accounting system, some sort of record-keeping system. If you know accounting and can practice it, you are valuable. You services are valuable. Thus… employment.

Welfare: A job brings financial reward. It allows you to pay for what you need – a place to stay, food, a car, recreational activities, etc. Pretty obvious. Don’t take having a job for granted though – not having one can be disastrous. And with accounting jobs, you can make pretty decent money.

Self-confidence: A job gives you self-confidence. Or, conversely, not having a job causes lack of self-confidence. Ever met a confident unemployed person? I haven’t. When you have a job and you’re good at it and you’re making money, you’re inevitably more confident, more positive. That’s a good thing. A very good thing. Who wants to be shy, unconfident, meek in life? Not me.

Flexibility: Accountants can work in any type of business. They are needed in every type of business. So if you decide you want to work in the company that produces your favorite brand of perfume, or running shoes, or video games or movies – you can. And you can switch to another type of business again if you get bored.

Stability: Accountants and bookkeepers will be in demand for a long time. It’s not like you have to worry that maybe these professions will not be needed in 10 years time. They will. Which means that if you’re trained in these roles, you won’t have to worry. There will always be a place for you. That’s stability. That’s security. In the long-term.

Control of your own finances: Accounting is the language of business. Accounting involves learning how to “keep score" for a business. With this knowledge you would have more control of a business and its finances. You understand how this all works. Guess what? The same thing applies to your own personal finances – you would inevitably understand it more and have greater control over it. And that’s because you know accounting. The chances of you engaging in wreckless spending or losing track of the bills you owe are smaller when you know accounting.

So… Keep at your studies, soon you’ll have all the rewards listed above!

2. Questions from Student Accountants

In each issue of The Student Accountant newsletter, we’re going to list some of the latest questions from accounting students that have been posted on the
Accounting-Basics-For-Students.com
website regarding any accounting lessons and topics.

Some of these questions may not be of interest at all… If so, no worries, you’re not expected to read each one. Just browse through the list below and click on any questions that interest you to see the full article, and just skip the rest...

Also, feel free to submit comments on any of the questions/articles themselves.

Here are the latest and greatest accounting questions that have been submitted and answered:

3. A Simple Dictionary of Accounting Terms

Why did I put together an accounting dictionary, and how can it help you?

Well, over the course of my tutoring, lecturing and writing course materials for hundreds and hundreds of hours, I found that most students did not really understand even the simple terms like debit and credit, gross and net, capital and reserves, let alone more complicated terms like working capital and provisions.

What do you think happens when you don’t really understand a term like any of the ones mentioned above?

What happens is that you have difficulty understanding the concept being discussed (or just never fully get it at all), and at the end of the day you usually have to either resort to parrot learning or you have to reread something a number of times (like banging your head into a wall) or you flunk that section of your accounting studies. Oh man, what a pain in the you-know-what!

That’s why I created the dictionary – so accounting makes a lot more sense and is a lot easier. Fewer headaches.

With an accounting dictionary, you just look up the strange accounting words you read – and, because I explain them simply – you get it. No banging your head against a wall or tearing your hair out to try and get what the textbook says. You just understand it. Plain and simple.

You use it as a handy guide that you can refer to whenever you come across an accounting term you don’t feel you are totally certain about in your studies (there are hundreds of these terms if you really think about it).